Published April 26, 2011
A/N: I wrote this for Azila's contest, Writer's Roulette. I ended up crying near the end of it. 
I hope this is considered in the children genre, cause my genre was children's and my element was based off a famous poem.
Dedication!!! It's my virtual older sisters birthday today! Aaah! Happy birthday, Bekah/AriSkyWriter! I love ya and hope you have a wonderful birthday. Oh, and I hope you like your birthday fic! 
"Nothing Gold Can Stay," I read aloud to the children sitting in front of me on the plush carpet. Their curious faces, dirtied from playing outside, stared wide-eyed at me as they waited for me to continue.
"Nature's first green is gold.
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower.
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank down to grief.
As dawn goes down to day.
Nothing Gold can stay."
"Who wrote that?" a feeble voice asked from the back of the room. I glanced over five heads to see young Kim Lucy, a thoughtful frown playing upon her face. I took a moment to respond.
"Robert Frost," I informed her. "Does anyone know what it means?" No one responded. "Okay... Can anyone tell me whether it sounded happy, sad, angry?" Thomas, one of the older boys in the class, sitting in the front row, raised his hand, and I nodded at him to talk.
"It seemed kinda sad," he said. I nodded for him to continue. "Well... It seems like a lot of endings. Endings aren't very happy; ending a good book is sad, and when it's time for a friend to go home, it's kinda sad." I nodded.
"Good point." I smiled at him. "Does anyone know why it seems sad?" My thoughts were interrupted as a mother walked into the room, another parent strolling in to pick up their children after her. "Okay, we'll continue this discussion tomorrow. Have a good afternoon." I smiled at the group warmly.
A few minutes later, only two children remained in the play-room; a napping toddler named Clarisse, and Kim Lucy. Kim Lucy was a pretty little girl; with big green eyes, and a button nose. She had dark brown curls that wafted softly down her back. She had always been a little shy, and didn't get along very well with the other seven year old children at the day-care.
I was gathering up the toys to put away when she approached me. "Ms. Em?" I looked up from my task, and smiled at her, putting the final, thin children's book back into it's place.
"Yes, Lucy?"
"What does that poem mean?"
Lucy's parents were divorced; according to the Maid who came to pick her up everyday from the day-care after school, she never saw her mom, and her dad was a business man who traveled a lot. She didn't see him very often, and when he did come to pick her up, he marches in on his phone, takes her hand, and without a word spoken to Kim, leaves. I couldn't imagine how heart-broken that little girl must have been. I grew up in a big house, with a big family, and lots of land to run around on. I could still smell the Farm mixed with the smell of grilled cheese as Mom called us in for lunch. We'd call out teasing taunts to each other as we raced back the house. I cherished those memories from my child-hood and I couldn't imagine growing up without the things I took for granted.
"Well, Lucy," I stood up, taking a seat in one of the larger chairs in the room, and made enough room for her next to me before pulling her up. I handed her the page with the poem on it, and nodded at it. "What do you think it means?" She shrugged at me.
"It talks about dawn going down to day. That's change." Her voice grew slightly more feeble. "I don't like change."
I spoke softly, "Change can be very upsetting. It also talks about gold; golds a special, pretty color, isn't' it? Greens just an every-day color. I think it means, that as you grow older, you take more things for granted. You don't see them as such special things anymore." She looked up from the paper, towards me.
"Did you grow up?"
I considered this. "I did, somewhat. I moved to a big city after I got out of college, and tried to make something of myself. I forgot how much I loved the farm I grew up on. I didn't cherish those things that I had before."
"Ms. Em?"
"Hm?"
"My daddy grew up."
Points:
Time spent:
IP address:
Canary word: Present
Possible AI signals:
Original Text:
Are you sure you want to delete this comment? This cannot be undone.
Mark this comment as a review? Points will be awarded to the poster.
Your comment was posted, but it wasn’t long enough to count as a review. Reviews need about four complete sentences (at least 250 characters). Try writing another review that explains your thoughts in more detail — the author will appreciate it, and you’ll earn points for it.
140,590 Literary Works • 673,544 Reviews
First of all, forgive my horribleness of not reviewing until now.
Secondly, this review shall be all thanks and praise, and no critiquing
You did a lovely job on this story, Kinz! Thank you so much for writing it for me. I loved it! It was lovely and sad all at the same time. I felt so sorry for little Kim Lucy, but I loved the poem. I love poems in that style. All rhymey and old-fashioned
I feel like this is the perfect story for my birthday, since it's about not growing up. I decided long ago that I wasn't going to grow up, no matter how old I got. I love that you captured that in the story.
It amazes me that you seemed to capture so much of me in the story. I see myself in both the narrator and little Kim Lucy. I hate change and rarely look forward to it. And, I grew up in a big family with people all around. I love it!
Thank you again! *hugs* Love you!
Cute story. Is this a thing, though? Reading such downer poems to toddlers? Reading poems to them that say, "You're young now, but you're sure as heck gonna die!"
Was there any reason to call her feeble? It just seems kind of jammed in there without context.
Whoa! All of a sudden, we're ASSAILED by information. Was there any more subtle, more concise way to give us all this information? After a whole story of two sentence paragraphs, we're given this meaty thing. It breaks the feel of the whole story and is just forced exposition.
And was there a particular reason you capitalized "Maid"? Or "Farm"?
Misuse of a comma. That kind of comma should only be used when separating two complete sentences. "I handed her the page, and I nodded at it." Or "I handed her the page and nodded at it."
You're going to want to keep that whole sentence is past tense.
Nice ending, but you're going to need something after that. Maybe her parent comes to pick her up. Or maybe the narrator reacts to what she said. But you can't just end with "My daddy grew up." scene
Hi, Adoxa..um..graph…er…Hi!
I really liked what you’ve written, and really like the poem. However, I have a few comments and nitpicks…
This part I suggest you cut entirely. Start right off with the poem and introduce the scene and setting afterwards.
I’m not sure if you should center the poem (since it is being read) or if you should make it all italics. However, I’m quite certain that you shouldn’t italicize the first line and that alone. Either one or all.
I wouldn’t expect a child to be interested in the author of any particular poem. In this case, however, Kim has reason to be interested, since she’s got a few other questions.
I would cut it and replace it with the teacher telling the class who wrote the poem. This may not appeal to you though. Ignore me.
Very wise little fellow that. How old are these kids again? You have them sitting on the floor like preschoolers, yet they seem to grasp the poem rather well. Just sayin’…
This description of Kim is a little too much. It’s too bold. Try sneaking in an earlier description of her when she asks the first question (except I told you cut that question. >o<) Bunching it all up here is just infodumping.
That last bit, italicized, is very awkward. You have three commas in the whole sentence, and they aren’t all performing the same sort of tasks. I would suggest wording it like this:
“I put the last book into its place and looked up at Kim.”
You can see that I removed the unnecessary description of the book, and also the part about her smile. I cannot imagine a teacher patient enough to have smiles left over after a full day of teaching preschoolers. On that note, how in the world did she ever get them to all sit quietly to read Robert Frost? But I digress…
Anyways, the bolded part is incorrect. You’re looking for the possessive form of ‘it’…I-T-apostrophe-S (it’s) means ‘it is’. I-T-S (its) is the possessive form of ‘it’. When working with names that end in ‘s’, the possessive is like this: Louis’, James’...
I thought Lucy was her last name. Shouldn’t the teacher call her Kim?
There’s a lot wrong with this sentence. The first is that it’s too long. You should cut it up into many sentences instead of using commas and semicolons.
Secondly, ‘Maid’ does not need to be capitalized.
Thirdly, “from the day-care after school,” is a contradiction in terms. Is it day-care or school?
If you follow all my directions, you’ll end up with something like this:
“Lucy's parents were divorced, according to the maid who came to pick her up everyday after school. Lucy never saw her mom, and her dad was a business man who travelled a lot.”
See?
You have switched your tenses here. You were speaking in past tense before (left) and here you have it present tense (leaves).
‘Big’ is repetitive. Plus, it’s a very boring adjective. Try some other word, or describe how big her family/house was.
Anyways, that was all I could find. Keep writing!
The ending of this was very cute I think. Actually, the ending was sort of perfect for the story. I appreciate how you made this so leveled and smooth. The story wasn't in any way unbalanced. Mickixoxo seemed to have caught quite a few little things throughout the story. The part I was going to definitely point out was this:
I liked the story overall, but I also think that it was maybe done a little too simply. There was some depth to this, but there probably could have been a little more. It could have probably been a little more emotional, I think. I would have loved to have gotten a little more of a reaction from it.
But anyway, great job. Keep up the great work.
Oh dear Addy kins! (And BTW, it took me three tries to write "dear" XO)
I absolutely HATE this story! (JK I'm just jealous of your talent)
I think it's sad but somewhat inspiring at the same time. I love the little girl in this :3 she seems to cute! I think you have a good chance of giving some other contestants a run for their... points
BEST. POEM. EVER!! Stay gold, Ponyboy. Stay gold. Y.Y
I love that you used this poem and it definitely brings great meaning to this story in a whole :3
You should put an "or" between "sad, angry?" I understand that it's possible to leave the "or" off, but it just sounds awkward, and I think that you should just add it in, to reduce the awkwarness of that ending.
I LOVED that ending. It's very powerful and definitely a great way to end something like this. It's very meaningful and I just love it :3
Okay Imma go now cause this review is freakishly long O.e
(Review postponed until Review Day. Don't get your britches in a bunch)
This story was so touching that I have goosebumps right now! I love how it was written and the way the characters were portrayed. It shows that despite their youth, kids understand more than we think and the last line almost had me bawling, I swear! This was reallt well done. I loved it.
I don't really think that there's anything wrong with this story. It really touched my heart and gave me chills. I like how you described Lucy and her background as well as the main character. The story was easier to understand knowing their differences. It made me think and it proved a good point. Well done
hi,
first i loved it, truly loved it. my heart twitch and i got goose bumps(in good way of course).
i loved it *standing ovation* miss, EM.
i love the meaning and the poem. oh the poem!!!
well done Angelus! once again! well i don't know know what to say more... I've been driven through the story. i couldn't focus on the grammatical error, so i won't review that this time.
Keep Up and update us with more and more